64GB models will have as little as 23GB usable space available.

Microsoft's Surface Pro tablets, due to go on sale in the US and Canada on February 9th, have two storage options. The cheaper model will have 64GB of SSD storage; the more expensive one will have 128GB. Unsurprisingly, some of that space is used by the operating system itself, so not all of it is available to use for files. Surprisingly, there could be as little as 23GB free on a new device, with a whopping 41GB unavailable. The 128GB unit fares better, with 83GB available.

This isn't the first time we've heard grim tales about Surface disk space. Surface RT, which comes in 32GB and 64GB models, also reserves a large chunk of storage, with the result that the 32GB unit only has about 16GB of usable space.

41GB seems extraordinarily excessive. Where's it all going?

We don't know all the details just yet, but as with Surface Pro's ARM siblings, the truth might not be quite so bad when you examine it closely. For a start, the SSD, with its capacity of approximately 64 billion bytes, only has a formatted capacity of 59GB; that's five of the 41GB accounted for right there, due simply to differences in counting. Annoying, but the same "loss" exists on many other platforms too.

Both Surfaces dedicate a certain amount of disk space to recovery partitions, to enable the entire machine to be wiped and reset with no access to additional media. Presuming Microsoft is using 64-bit Windows 8 on the Surface Pro (which seems likely, as it's a 64-bit machine), this would typically account for around 8GB.

Windows itself takes up a big old chunk of disk space too. The disk image I have of a fairly pristine (albeit patched and up-to-date) Windows 8 install takes a shade under 14GB, and about 4GB of that image represents page file. Similar numbers are reasonable on the Surface Pro, perhaps a little more depending on what options it has turned on. Another 3-4 gigabytes will then be used by the hibernation file (hibernation files used to have to exactly match the RAM size, but recent versions of Windows compress them somewhat to reduce the disk impact).

Windows also tends to be a little more generous than strictly necessary with the size of its boot partitions and related bookkeeping information, so we might expect to see perhaps a gigabyte occupied there.

Still, this would only come to about 32 of the 64GB used. Where's the other 9 going? One possibility is that Surface Pro comes with software preinstalled. Although one would expect a PC from Microsoft to be crapware free, it wouldn't be altogether surprising if Microsoft included a trial version of Office 2013; after all, Microsoft really does want to coax users into signing up for a $99/year Office 365 subscription, so making the first hit free to Surface Pro buyers wouldn't be too shocking. Something like this would gobble up another 2-3 gigabytes.

As for the rest? That's anyone's guess. Another 6-7 gigabytes does sound like a lot, certainly more than you'd like to lose. It's not impossible that some of it's taken up by Windows itself, if for example Microsoft has included some of the more common language packs.

The other option? Microsoft is simply being conservative, and there will be more space on these devices than the company has said. This isn't such a stretch; the numbers Redmond gave for Surface RT's free space were lower than the reality on shipping devices.

If you want to obliterate the recovery partition and take back that space, there's an easy way to do that, by the way. Start the "Create a recovery drive" tool and it gives the option to copy the recovery partition to a USB key and then remove it from the hard disk, freeing up the space it occupies.

Nonetheless, it's clear that a surprisingly big chunk of space is used up on the Surface Pros. Windows 8 is pretty big—much bigger than iOS and Android, for example—and that's certainly a major part of the issue. It's comparable in size to OS X Mountain Lion, however, so whether the operating system takes up "too much" room depends on whether you're comparing Surface Pro to laptops, in which case it's about right, or tablets, in which case it's obese.

This is also exacerbated by some of Microsoft's design decisions. Including a recovery image on the system disk itself makes sense, since it's fast and convenient should you need to reset the machine. But it also means burning 8GB of disk space, permanently. Was it the right thing to do? That's harder to say. OS X uses another approach; it has a small recovery environment that can download a fresh operating system image from the Internet. That's much lighter on the disk, but for most Internet connections it's a great deal more time-consuming.

Before the Internet download option, some Macs shipped with USB keys containing the operating system image. Again, this alleviates the permanent disk usage, but it's also inevitable that the USB key will go missing just when you need it most. Still, if this is the option you prefer, you can go this route with Windows using the built-in recovery drive tool.

Microsoft's choice may be heavier on disk space, but it's also robust and efficient (remembering, of course, that guarding against disk failure is irrelevant; Surface Pro won't contain a user-serviceable disk, so there's never any need to install the operating system onto a blank machine).

If space availability continues to be a problem for Surface users, there are other storage options too. Carrying around a USB 3 disk isn't particularly elegant (though it opens the door to almost unlimited extra space), but sticking a microSDXC card in the slot to add another 64GB is simple enough.

23GB of available space is certainly enough to give people pause for thought, however, and that's really not what Microsoft needs. The 128GB model is a lot more comfortable, but unless you live in the cloud, the 64GB units may be best avoided.

196 Reader Comments

Really I don't know why MS would release a 64GB version of the Surface Pro at all, unless they think people want to use the device as a pure tablet which makes no sense since battery life is worse.

Unless you lug around your multimedia library (most business users don't), 30GB will go a long way to store all your documents on the go. Plus it has a SD card slot for up to 64GB extra. That's more than the biggest ipad today. No matter how many haters are piling on this issue, the bottom line is people can get their work done on this machine. You can't say the same for ipads and Android tablets.

You can't generalize. Artists do work and needs tons of space. Musicians - who really benefit from portability and touchscreens, btw. Or how about developing and using virtual machines?

The set of compromises to get 'productivity' on a tablet with Surface negates the productivity. Small screens, keyboard, space, high price.

I just went through this with my Apple TV: a completely new OS (that adds Bluetooth capability, out of nowhere!) is now installed, and all I had to do was click one button on the remote. The device found out about the upgrade; downloaded it; flashed the firmware; rebooted; downloaded some more stuff; transferred all my data/settings (that it had stored somewhere -- there's no hard drive) and then rebooted back to exactly where I was, halfway through watching a particular file.

You're wrong. The Apple TV does have a 'hard drive' (the Apple TV 2 and 3 have an 8GB SSD). And the upgrade was so easy because most settings are stored on the Apple servers or on iTunes (if you use media sharing), and becuase the Apple TV uses a even more trimmed down version of a cell phone operating system (iOS).

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My desktop and laptop Macs do the same thing. The 4 GB recovery partition installs itself and then goes online to retrieve the latest versions of the bulkier portions of the OS. The original downloaded installer even re-partitions the boot drive without tampering with the data that's stored on it.

The recovery function in Windows 8 does something similar, aside from downloading the OS over the internet.

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The whole iOS thing worked perfectly when each iOS device was a satellite of a full-fledged PC, but (as of two years ago) the iOS devices are now autonomous; but they still keep themselves up to date just as seamlessly as they used to, and they don't have recovery partitions.

Sure, but iOS is still a stripped down tablet and phone OS and not a full blown 64bit desktop OS.

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It's not just that Microsoft can't beat Apple when it comes to streamlining the OS file sizes (although they can't). It's that they're way behind with regard to all the install/upgrade/update/recovery technology. It's not like Apple's doing anything particularly advanced or innovative here, either -- it's just good old-fashioned diligent engineering.

You may want to take your fanboi glasses off for a while and look at the reality, which is that other phone/tablet OSes like Android or Windows Phone (and Windows CE, Windows RT and all rthe Embedded variants) share a similar size vs functionality ratio, so nothing special here. The main difference is that Apple relies more on recovery over the internet (which, especially for a mobile device, isn't the best thing if you're out in the sticks with no broadband connection and no free WiFi in sight, and similarly so on metered connections) while MS believes that having all necessary parts on disk is more useful (which, in my experience, it is).

The only thing MS did wrong with the Surface Pro is offering a 64GB version at all. At this price the entry should come with 128GB.

I'm willing to bet that the actual figures on production units will be much better then these prerelease figures. Even if they're not, I'll go on record saying that it will be easy to drop the OS footprint by offloading things like the recovery partition.

On my Win 8 install, with the normal restore options (so any update that's been installed has left some form of restore point), I'm sitting at 11gigabytes for the Windows folder, 8 of which is the WinSxS folder. (WinSxS is essentially the Windows operating system)

If I really got picky about what components I have installed, and restricted system restore points I imagine I could get that figure down by a couple of gigabytes at least.

I don't know why people are voting your comment down. Everything you wrote is factual, and it's up to the user to decide whether to delete the recovery partition or not.

I just went through this with my Apple TV: a completely new OS (that adds Bluetooth capability, out of nowhere!) is now installed, and all I had to do was click one button on the remote. The device found out about the upgrade; downloaded it; flashed the firmware; rebooted; downloaded some more stuff; transferred all my data/settings (that it had stored somewhere -- there's no hard drive) and then rebooted back to exactly where I was, halfway through watching a particular file.

You're wrong. The Apple TV does have a 'hard drive' (the Apple TV 2 and 3 have an 8GB SSD). And the upgrade was so easy because most settings are stored on the Apple servers or on iTunes (if you use media sharing), and becuase the Apple TV uses a even more trimmed down version of a cell phone operating system (iOS).

Quote:

My desktop and laptop Macs do the same thing. The 4 GB recovery partition installs itself and then goes online to retrieve the latest versions of the bulkier portions of the OS. The original downloaded installer even re-partitions the boot drive without tampering with the data that's stored on it.

The recovery function in Windows 8 does something similar, aside from downloading the OS over the internet.

Quote:

The whole iOS thing worked perfectly when each iOS device was a satellite of a full-fledged PC, but (as of two years ago) the iOS devices are now autonomous; but they still keep themselves up to date just as seamlessly as they used to, and they don't have recovery partitions.

Sure, but iOS is still a stripped down tablet and phone OS and not a full blown 64bit desktop OS.

Quote:

It's not just that Microsoft can't beat Apple when it comes to streamlining the OS file sizes (although they can't). It's that they're way behind with regard to all the install/upgrade/update/recovery technology. It's not like Apple's doing anything particularly advanced or innovative here, either -- it's just good old-fashioned diligent engineering.

You may want to take your fanboi glasses off for a while and look at the reality, which is that other phone/tablet OSes like Android or Windows Phone (and Windows CE, Windows RT and all rthe Embedded variants) share a similar size vs functionality ratio, so nothing special here. The main difference is that Apple relies more on recovery over the internet (which, especially for a mobile device, isn't the best thing if you're out in the sticks with no broadband connection and no free WiFi in sight, and similarly so on metered connections) while MS believes that having all necessary parts on disk is more useful (which, in my experience, it is).

The only thing MS did wrong with the Surface Pro is offering a 64GB version at all. At this price the entry should come with 128GB.

All right, but could you lose the contentious, belligerent attitude?

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Sure, but iOS is still a stripped down tablet and phone OS and not a full blown 64bit desktop OS.

That's part of the problem, isn't it? The fact is that the Surface Pro wastes space with a recovery partition and the iPad doesn't (and iPad users hardly suffer).

My gut call is that you'd be nuts to buy a 64GB Surface Pro. If it were me, I'd hold out for 256. But I would be very hard pressed to cough up the premium for the tablet form factor, which was always Windows' biggest problem on tablets. Lopping off a lot of hardware should not make your device more expensive.

Well, if you can upgrade the SSD yourself then it really doesn't matter. I know I plan on using this thing pretty heavily both for work and play once I get it so I would definitely like a bigger SSD in it.

Have you ever heard anyone mention upgradeability? So far, none of the tablets can be upgraded in either ram or drive storage. There's so little space inside that everything has to be soldered. Unless we hear otherwise, I think it'd be smart to assume the Surface Pros are the same as all the others.

Really I don't know why MS would release a 64GB version of the Surface Pro at all, unless they think people want to use the device as a pure tablet which makes no sense since battery life is worse.

Unless you lug around your multimedia library (most business users don't), 30GB will go a long way to store all your documents on the go. Plus it has a SD card slot for up to 64GB extra. That's more than the biggest ipad today. No matter how many haters are piling on this issue, the bottom line is people can get their work done on this machine. You can't say the same for ipads and Android tablets.

You can't generalize. Artists do work and needs tons of space. Musicians - who really benefit from portability and touchscreens, btw. Or how about developing and using virtual machines?

The set of compromises to get 'productivity' on a tablet with Surface negates the productivity. Small screens, keyboard, space, high price.

I wasn't generalizing. All I'm saying is 64GB is sufficient for quite a few users out there. Previous poster was saying MS shouldn't even bother with the 64GB version.

And if we are going to consider usage models of those artists, photographers, musicans, and other productive workers who happen to stress the storage system, shouldn't we also be comparing disk usage against MB/MBA instead of ipad? From what I've read, there's none or only small difference (3-5GB) between OS X and W8 install size. In this context, the beating MS is taking seems very unfair, doesn't it?

The Pro is targeted at the enterprise market not the home user. I know lots of people in manufacturing and other industries who re salivating over this thing. I know plenty of tech professionals who are as well. Including me. If you plan on using this as a desktop/laptop replacement then no it's not a device for you. If you plan on using this device in a professional setting and join it to your business network then this thing is perfect for you. You will have access to network storage.

What this highlights to me is how little Microsoft understands about marketing. Rather than encouraging the world to be upset over the outrage (“unacceptable” in comments here) about maybe $15 of storage space, they could have simply highlighted a larger tablet as their base unit, and listed the smaller one for more compact needs.

Really, the whole notion of Windows8 on a tablet is that you get a “full” operating system, not a “stripped down” one streamlined for mobile. If you try to compare and price it against a mobile-only product, you are going to lose, as Microsoft is doing here. Opinions may differ about the whole refrigerator+toaster thing, but if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

A company that was connected to its customers better would've seen this coming. Next time somebody dismisses Apple as“ just a marketing company with white-label production contracts,” they should look at how this mismatch between expectations and reality can make it hard for customers to understand how to use it.

On my Win 8 install, with the normal restore options (so any update that's been installed has left some form of restore point), I'm sitting at 11gigabytes for the Windows folder, 8 of which is the WinSxS folder. (WinSxS is essentially the Windows operating system)

WinSxS actually stores multiple versions of a DLLs to prevent compatibility problems by programs that depend on different versions of a library. It's the result of lacking proper package management. A more correct way to say what you did: WinSxS is essentially a complete history of the Windows OS since installation.

WinSxS is actually an excellent method of package management. It frees the user from recompiling under-maintained programs each time new versions of major libraries are out. It also insures software runs exactly as the developer intended.

The package management argument is one I hear from the Linux crowd a lot. Then when one actually tries to use Linux with some pieces of older software, it turns into a usability nightmare.

Developers write and test software with the libraries they have at hand. They do not design their software to run exclusively based on the theoretical manner in which the libraries should operate, but rather as they actually do. Recompiling software on later libraries is just asking for problems in many cases.

Open source is like arguing we should go back to 1950's - 1960's model carburetors and distributors so the end user can always tinker with the timing and fuel characteristics of the automobile. How many people here remember having to tweak the air needle on a carburetor and give the dizzy a twist because they moved homes and changed elevation by 2000 ft and available octane level in gas by 3 points.

What this highlights to me is how little Microsoft understands about marketing. Rather than encouraging the world to be upset over the outrage (“unacceptable” in comments here) about maybe $15 of storage space, they could have simply highlighted a larger tablet as their base unit, and listed the smaller one for more compact needs.

Really, the whole notion of Windows8 on a tablet is that you get a “full” operating system, not a “stripped down” one streamlined for mobile. If you try to compare and price it against a mobile-only product, you are going to lose, as Microsoft is doing here. Opinions may differ about the whole refrigerator+toaster thing, but if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

A company that was connected to its customers better would've seen this coming. Next time somebody dismisses Apple as“ just a marketing company with white-label production contracts,” they should look at how this mismatch between expectations and reality can make it hard for customers to understand how to use it.

Right, but that's the essence of Microsoft's problem in this space:

1) Apple announces and demos iPad

2) Many complain that it "doesn't run a real desktop operating system" (and therefore will fail in the market)

3) iPad debuts; is an explosive success

4) Rather than concluding, "I guess those critics who complained about the lack of a real desktop operating system had it wrong; that's a strength, not a weakness," Microsoft concludes, "iPad is selling really well despite this crippling limitation -- imagine how well it would sell with a real desktop operating system!"

Their entire course of action is based on this erroneous conclusion. The iPad triumphed by taking away something that everyone had assumed was crucial. The assumption had to be rescinded. But, rather than doing that, Microsoft simply assumed that adding back in the part that Apple took out would "fix" the iPad's flaws (rather than removing its benefits).

My gut call is that you'd be nuts to buy a 64GB Surface Pro. If it were me, I'd hold out for 256. But I would be very hard pressed to cough up the premium for the tablet form factor, which was always Windows' biggest problem on tablets. Lopping off a lot of hardware should not make your device more expensive.

Well, if you can upgrade the SSD yourself then it really doesn't matter. I know I plan on using this thing pretty heavily both for work and play once I get it so I would definitely like a bigger SSD in it.

Have you ever heard anyone mention upgradeability? So far, none of the tablets can be upgraded in either ram or drive storage. There's so little space inside that everything has to be soldered. Unless we hear otherwise, I think it'd be smart to assume the Surface Pros are the same as all the others.

Looking at the device it looks like it may be. We won't know for sure till later but if it isn't then this will be my work only device. If it is then I will be even happier. This is not your average 'tablet.'

"This is also exacerbated by some of Microsoft's design decisions. Including a recovery image on the system disk itself makes sense, since it's fast and convenient should you need to reset the machine. But it also means burning 8 GB of disk space, permanently. Was it the right thing to do? That's harder to say. OS X uses another approach; it has a small recovery environment that can download a fresh operating system image from the Internet. That's much lighter on the disk, but for most Internet connections, a great deal more time-consuming."

Time consuming? That's nonsense, you don't need to recover your system every day, so that's a logical decision to have the operating system downloaded from Internet. Oh wait, that's Windows! Could it be that you need indeed to recover a system so often that it needs to eat you up 8GB of your storage space to have the recovery image on disk? That's probably that....

Whatever the reasons, the end result is that it makes Microsoft's offering that much less competitive in this market.

And what market is that? the general consumer tablet market? They have the only tablet which is running a full blown desktop OS making it able to be joined to any network giving it access to network shares and resources. It's the only tablet which allows users to install key apps they run on their workstations on their tablet allowing them to do things they have been wishing they could do on the go with existing tablets. This is the only truly enterprise ready tablet. They are the only ones in this market. People keep thinking this is targeted at the home user. It is not. This is a business device. This thing will sell well in the business market.

What this highlights to me is how little Microsoft understands about marketing. Rather than encouraging the world to be upset over the outrage (“unacceptable” in comments here) about maybe $15 of storage space, they could have simply highlighted a larger tablet as their base unit, and listed the smaller one for more compact needs.

Really, the whole notion of Windows8 on a tablet is that you get a “full” operating system, not a “stripped down” one streamlined for mobile. If you try to compare and price it against a mobile-only product, you are going to lose, as Microsoft is doing here. Opinions may differ about the whole refrigerator+toaster thing, but if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

A company that was connected to its customers better would've seen this coming. Next time somebody dismisses Apple as“ just a marketing company with white-label production contracts,” they should look at how this mismatch between expectations and reality can make it hard for customers to understand how to use it.

huh? It's not MS doing all those stupid and unfair comparison. It's the usual blogosphere eager to spin anything against MS to make a catchy headline. C'mon, they do this for living!

You are right about this being only a minor thing and nothing new. That's why MS don't go low and try to explain everything. Otherwise, they look petty and just draws more attention to this stupid negative narrative from some bloggers. MS sees stuffs like this everyday. I believe they've decided to take the high road and let the products do the talking.

2) Many complain that it "doesn't run a real desktop operating system" (and therefore will fail in the market)

3) iPad debuts; is an explosive success

4) Rather than concluding, "I guess those critics who complained about the lack of a real desktop operating system had it wrong; that's a strength, not a weakness," Microsoft concludes, "iPad is selling really well despite this crippling limitation -- imagine how well it would sell with a real desktop operating system!"

Their entire course of action is based on this erroneous conclusion. The iPad triumphed by taking away something that everyone had assumed was crucial. The assumption had to be rescinded. But, rather than doing that, Microsoft simply assumed that adding back in the part that Apple took out would "fix" the iPad's flaws (rather than removing its benefits).

Ah, the flawed use-case argument. The iPad is a poor fit for "the rest of us," just like the lack of a stylus in tablet computing.

The conclusion is actually that a lot, probably a majority, of computer users just need a consumption device or vendor limited content creation needs. This doesn't fit everyone.

I have 3 semesters of class notes in OneNote which could never have effectively been taken on an iPad to back myself up here, and there are plenty of other examples in the creative and content fields as well.

Just because certain products are not a runaway success does not mean they don't have a place in the market. Touch screen (point of sale) workstation monitors never took off with consumers in the 90's, but that didn't mean they weren't absolutely needed in their field and an excellent implementation of technology.

2) Many complain that it "doesn't run a real desktop operating system" (and therefore will fail in the market)

3) iPad debuts; is an explosive success

4) Rather than concluding, "I guess those critics who complained about the lack of a real desktop operating system had it wrong; that's a strength, not a weakness," Microsoft concludes, "iPad is selling really well despite this crippling limitation -- imagine how well it would sell with a real desktop operating system!"

Their entire course of action is based on this erroneous conclusion. The iPad triumphed by taking away something that everyone had assumed was crucial. The assumption had to be rescinded. But, rather than doing that, Microsoft simply assumed that adding back in the part that Apple took out would "fix" the iPad's flaws (rather than removing its benefits).

Ah, the flawed use-case argument. The iPad is a poor fit for "the rest of us," just like the lack of a stylus in tablet computing.

The conclusion is actually that a lot, probably a majority, of computer users just need a consumption device or vendor limited content creation needs. This doesn't fit everyone.

I have 3 semesters of class notes in OneNote which could never have effectively been taken on an iPad to back myself up here, and there are plenty of other examples in the creative and content fields as well.

Just because certain products are not a runaway success does not mean they don't have a place in the market. Touch screen (point of sale) workstation monitors never took off with consumers in the 90's, but that didn't mean they weren't absolutely needed in their field and an excellent implementation of technology.

Fair enough, but somewhat beside the point. It's my fault; apologies for not making myself clear. I was responding to (and agreeing with) a point about Microsoft's market positioning:

Quote:

if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

In other words, the flawed logic I'm describing (the "use-case") argument is what has led Microsoft to position the Surface as a "better iPad" and therefore disappoint consumers.

Well, if you can upgrade the SSD yourself then it really doesn't matter. I know I plan on using this thing pretty heavily both for work and play once I get it so I would definitely like a bigger SSD in it.

Have you ever heard anyone mention upgradeability? So far, none of the tablets can be upgraded in either ram or drive storage. There's so little space inside that everything has to be soldered. Unless we hear otherwise, I think it'd be smart to assume the Surface Pros are the same as all the others.

Looking at the device it looks like it may be. We won't know for sure till later but if it isn't then this will be my work only device. If it is then I will be even happier. This is not your average 'tablet.'

Surface RT solders them on. But I wonder what you are looking at to conclude the pro "might be."

Leave it to Mickeysoft for coming out with a new product that is flawed and doomed to be the laughing stock of the whole Tablet world... hehehe. The come out with a new device and it they can't even find a way to calculate disk space properly. AND Never could. The new surface thingy they have (Which I'm sure will be a HUGE failure) is supposed to have 128GB of space... OH But wait..we have to put 40 GB of BLOATWARE there instead of USEFUL Space for Oh ..tunes ... Work Docs, Videos, Games or something MORE useful then the crappy OS they put on it.

Well Ok Enough Ranting for now... But really Folks... MS Screwed the pouch ...AGAIN. They should actually be sued for this,,, FALSE Advertising Claiming one but giving something completely different.I just Hope this is the stay that breaks the camels back... Break it up and sell it all

I need to jump in on this pagefile issue! Fascinating! First, I appreciate adminfoo's link to the guy who knows what he's on about with the way Windows allocates memory - that description is pretty much spot on. However, when he runs off in to cloud cuckoo land is where he starts talking about (paraphrased) "Imagine you have an app that grabs 80% of your memory..." Whilst what he's saying is technically right, how often does that really happen?

If you are running a workload where this is a possibility, then yeah, disabling your backing store is a "Bad Idea" (tm)

However, if you are like most people, and don't mind the occasional 'Low Memory' popup then running without a backing store is fine too. Certainly, it's not as doom and gloom as some of these pagefile fundamentalists would have you believe.

"Some applications won't work without a page file" is, frankly, nonsense. Applications have no notion of swap file, they are not coded to manage their own memory - Windows deals with that for them, and Windows doesn't tell them what sort of memory they're getting (swap or otherwise). When Windows deals with memory allocation it simply says to each application "You have 8TB to play with" (64bit system) no matter how much memory or pagefile or CPU cache (!) you have. After this it juggles the requests for memory as best it can, preemptively paging to disk as the link above says. However, if you are running an insane amount of memory and aren't completely bonkers about the apps you are trying to run, there is no particular reason to utilise a page file.

Now since Windows 7 (I think, might have been in Vista too) Windows has been much more aggressive about using the fullness of the available RAM, so whereas before, memory that was paged to disk would also be zeroed in RAM, now Windows leaves it in RAM too, just in case. So should a request come in for a page that is on the disk, whereas before it would need to be loaded in from disk (SLOOOWWWW), sometimes now it is already in RAM, substantially speeding up your PC. This is functionally equivalent to running without a pagefile anyway provided you have enough RAM. i.e. you won't notice a performance benefit nowadays running without a pagefile.

So, ultimately the only consideration comes down to this: Will not running a swapfile save my SSD some writes? And that only matters if you're really that paranoid about your SSD wearing out.

In short, if you have more than enough ram, your system will run just fine without the pagefile. The only thing you are missing out on is the dump log that windows generates when it crashes. Big whoop. The only downside is that if windows runs out of ram it will generate low memory errors and kill the program. This is better than windows trying to swap everything out to the hard drive and bringing the system to a crawl.

If you do put a swap file on your SSD, you can expect windows to still use it, no matter how much ram you have. All of this constant data transfer will do nothing but shorten the life of your SSD.

I've been running without swap files for years now on my system with 8GB of ram. Normally I only need half of that so I never have any issues with lack of memory or needing a swap file. Don't listen to all the neckbeard haters on this forum. They just get butthurt about people not doing things the "right way" :roll

Since you did compare the Desktop to the WinSurPro (yet to come out) -- let's look at the Mac I'm typing from.

Mac OS system install with all current updates ~3GB ±

Total Drive capactiy is 320GB.

That gives me + the system + any installed software around 317GB to dump all of our junk.

(I'm running an HDD so it would not have to compensate for the allotment partition on the SSDs)

But even with your breakdown why the hell does M$ need 10GB to run a standard install ? I just checked a Win7 install I have and it pulls roughly the same 10GB for the OS. [bloatware much ?]

Just one more reason to not buy M$ products if they advertise a product with 64GB of space then they should not be blocking nearly 35-64% of the usable capacity. More than likely folks should complain to force them to change their marketing specs to the tune of "Surface available in 23GB and 83GB capacitites."

What this highlights to me is how little Microsoft understands about marketing. Rather than encouraging the world to be upset over the outrage (“unacceptable” in comments here) about maybe $15 of storage space, they could have simply highlighted a larger tablet as their base unit, and listed the smaller one for more compact needs.

Really, the whole notion of Windows8 on a tablet is that you get a “full” operating system, not a “stripped down” one streamlined for mobile. If you try to compare and price it against a mobile-only product, you are going to lose, as Microsoft is doing here. Opinions may differ about the whole refrigerator+toaster thing, but if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

A company that was connected to its customers better would've seen this coming. Next time somebody dismisses Apple as“ just a marketing company with white-label production contracts,” they should look at how this mismatch between expectations and reality can make it hard for customers to understand how to use it.

Right, but that's the essence of Microsoft's problem in this space:

1) Apple announces and demos iPad

2) Many complain that it "doesn't run a real desktop operating system" (and therefore will fail in the market)

3) iPad debuts; is an explosive success

4) Rather than concluding, "I guess those critics who complained about the lack of a real desktop operating system had it wrong; that's a strength, not a weakness," Microsoft concludes, "iPad is selling really well despite this crippling limitation -- imagine how well it would sell with a real desktop operating system!"

Their entire course of action is based on this erroneous conclusion. The iPad triumphed by taking away something that everyone had assumed was crucial. The assumption had to be rescinded. But, rather than doing that, Microsoft simply assumed that adding back in the part that Apple took out would "fix" the iPad's flaws (rather than removing its benefits).

Actually this is far better than an iPad for enterprise use which is what this is actually meant for. iPads, like all other tablets until now, are toys. PLUS try to remember the biggest selling point for Apple and Android tablets and phones is the Apps library they have. Well, last I checked the ability to run full blown windows on this tablet gives it access to ALL applications written to run on Windows. How big is that library? It dwarfs iOS's and Android's. this also comes with one very important option most business people I have had to support have asked for. the ability to run some of the apps they run on their workstations to allow them to not have to run back to their desk to enter data. You seem to think MS is trying to capture the home user tablet market with this device. They are going after the market they have been dominant in for a VERY long time. The enterprise. future incarnations of this device will likely drop in price and will then make their way to the home users. I know home users today who are hold off buying the newest iPad or Android offerings to buy this simply because it runs full blown Windows.

The lack of a full blown OS actually is a flaw but since all tablets have had this flaw people didn't have any choice. now that this is coming out they will have a choice. I expect Apple to do something similar soon before more affordable versions of these things hit the market. If they are smart they re currently working on getting the desktop OS to run well on their iPad soon. If they aren't then they will lose a sizable portion of the tablet market to Windows as they did with the desktop market. Let's be honest. If someone is given the choice between a tablet that can only run special apps written for a tablet or a tablet which can run any and all applications they already own and run on their desktop which do you suppose they will choose? I know which one I would choose. I'm willing to bet MANY Apple users wish their iPads ran Lion or whatever the latest Apple desktop OS is. The ones I know certainly do.

Well, if you can upgrade the SSD yourself then it really doesn't matter. I know I plan on using this thing pretty heavily both for work and play once I get it so I would definitely like a bigger SSD in it.

Have you ever heard anyone mention upgradeability? So far, none of the tablets can be upgraded in either ram or drive storage. There's so little space inside that everything has to be soldered. Unless we hear otherwise, I think it'd be smart to assume the Surface Pros are the same as all the others.

Looking at the device it looks like it may be. We won't know for sure till later but if it isn't then this will be my work only device. If it is then I will be even happier. This is not your average 'tablet.'

Surface RT solders them on. But I wonder what you are looking at to conclude the pro "might be."

The Pro sounds more like a small ultra book with touch enabled than a minimalist device like your traditional tablet.

In the days before write-leveling, WinXP could destroy an SSD in hours

Not true.

Anandtech have been running their review SSDs permanently - some for over 10000 hours now - the only faults I can recall them reporting were the Vertex 3 showing of sandforce's duff controller and the M4 hitting its 'total active life' bug

Since you did compare the Desktop to the WinSurPro (yet to come out) -- let's look at the Mac I'm typing from.

Mac OS system install with all current updates ~3GB ±

Total Drive capactiy is 320GB.

That gives me + the system + any installed software around 317GB to dump all of our junk.

(I'm running an HDD so it would not have to compensate for the allotment partition on the SSDs)

But even with your breakdown why the hell does M$ need 10GB to run a standard install ? I just checked a Win7 install I have and it pulls roughly the same 10GB for the OS. [bloatware much ?]

Just one more reason to not buy M$ products if they advertise a product with 64GB of space then they should not be blocking nearly 35-64% of the usable capacity. More than likely folks should complain to force them to change their marketing specs to the tune of "Surface available in 23GB and 83GB capacitites."

The biggest reason to buy this device is the ability to run existing Windows apps on it. If you are using this at work, since this is actually targeted at the business user, then you will have this thing joined to your network and so will have access to all your network shares and other resources. This ability alone makes it worth the asking price.

fiddley, before I do the quote-and-reply thing, let me say that I'm not really disagreeing with you. Just extending the discussion a little.

fiddley wrote:

I need to jump in on this pagefile issue! Fascinating! First, I appreciate adminfoo's link to the guy who knows what he's on about with the way Windows allocates memory - that description is pretty much spot on. However, when he runs off in to cloud cuckoo land is where he starts talking about (paraphrased) "Imagine you have an app that grabs 80% of your memory..." Whilst what he's saying is technically right, how often does that really happen?

I thought of it as using a slightly extreme example to make the point easier to grasp. And that exact example may happen rarely, but in a system with 4 or 8 gigs of RAM, how unlikely is it that 3 or 4 apps try to allocate 2GB apiece? Or some other combination of demands puts the system under pressure? I suppose it's also germane that the post I linked was in a server forum, and server-side programs that try to consume all available RAM are less rare.

Anyway, the real deal with pagefile, imho, is that a lot of us are still managing our pagefiles as though the year were 1998 and we were still running NT 4.0. Things have changed since then. We have more memory, we have much larger disks, and we have an OS that self-manages a lot better than anything did in 1998.

fiddley wrote:

"Some applications won't work without a page file" is, frankly, nonsense. Applications have no notion of swap file, they are not coded to manage their own memory - Windows deals with that for them, and Windows doesn't tell them what sort of memory they're getting (swap or otherwise). When Windows deals with memory allocation it simply says to each application "You have 8TB to play with" (64bit system) no matter how much memory or pagefile or CPU cache (!) you have. After this it juggles the requests for memory as best it can, preemptively paging to disk as the link above says. However, if you are running an insane amount of memory and aren't completely bonkers about the apps you are trying to run, there is no particular reason to utilise a page file.

All this is technically true and proper, in a best-practices sort of way. But it's also technically true that some applications have been written by devs who apparently took no time to understand the memory model, and who then compounded their error by going out of their way to check pagefile numbers and behave bizarrely if those numbers didn't meet with their approval. An example was given here in this thread. It's pure stupidity but it does happen.

Excuse me, but where was the bit about "2. Back truck up to loading dock of computer center"? As this is Windows, would you not also need to deforest Washington State, which I note is conveniently placed close by to Redmond?

Excuse me, but where was the bit about "2. Back truck up to loading dock of computer center"? As this is Windows, would you not also need to deforest Washington State, which I note is conveniently placed close by to Redmond?

Interesting question. Each card is a line of code, right? So how many tons of paper would you need for Windows 8? (Or even for the average jpg or mp3 file?)

For a start, the SSD, with its capacity of approximately 64 billion bytes, only has a formatted capacity of 59 GB; that's five of the 41 GB accounted for right there

Please identify your units correctly in the article (even if MSFT / others persist in inaccuracy). The Base 2 unit is GiB, the Base 10 unit is GB. A good way to prevent continued derprage on this "loss of space" is through education about the proper units.

Computer storage is in Base 2, both GB and GiB are the same the only different is the standards prefix they use which the SI prefix is way more dominate than IEEE prefixes.

Why should computer storage be in base-2? This is far from universally agreed. Apple and HD manufacturers use base 10, Microsoft (and ArsTechnica) are the holdouts with base 2.

For computer *memory* it makes sense to use base 2 because it has inherently binary sizes, but this is not true for computer storage. File sizes and drive sizes are used by non-technical users and there is no reason why they should have to understand base 2.

When I go "dir /s" I get base-10 file sizes and I dislike having to convert to base-2 in order to figure out how much of my drive they use.

Base-2 is less pervasive in computing than many nerds think. Network speeds and clock speeds have always been base 10.

Base 2 does not make sense for storage (except when looking at the size of an individual sector). It has never made sense for storage. Saying that "storage is in Base 2" doesn't make it so, and it doesn't make it sensible.

What this highlights to me is how little Microsoft understands about marketing. Rather than encouraging the world to be upset over the outrage (“unacceptable” in comments here) about maybe $15 of storage space, they could have simply highlighted a larger tablet as their base unit, and listed the smaller one for more compact needs.

Really, the whole notion of Windows8 on a tablet is that you get a “full” operating system, not a “stripped down” one streamlined for mobile. If you try to compare and price it against a mobile-only product, you are going to lose, as Microsoft is doing here. Opinions may differ about the whole refrigerator+toaster thing, but if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

A company that was connected to its customers better would've seen this coming. Next time somebody dismisses Apple as“ just a marketing company with white-label production contracts,” they should look at how this mismatch between expectations and reality can make it hard for customers to understand how to use it.

Right, but that's the essence of Microsoft's problem in this space:

1) Apple announces and demos iPad

2) Many complain that it "doesn't run a real desktop operating system" (and therefore will fail in the market)

3) iPad debuts; is an explosive success

4) Rather than concluding, "I guess those critics who complained about the lack of a real desktop operating system had it wrong; that's a strength, not a weakness," Microsoft concludes, "iPad is selling really well despite this crippling limitation -- imagine how well it would sell with a real desktop operating system!"

Their entire course of action is based on this erroneous conclusion. The iPad triumphed by taking away something that everyone had assumed was crucial. The assumption had to be rescinded. But, rather than doing that, Microsoft simply assumed that adding back in the part that Apple took out would "fix" the iPad's flaws (rather than removing its benefits).

Actually this is far better than an iPad for enterprise use which is what this is actually meant for. iPads, like all other tablets until now, are toys. PLUS try to remember the biggest selling point for Apple and Android tablets and phones is the Apps library they have. Well, last I checked the ability to run full blown windows on this tablet gives it access to ALL applications written to run on Windows. How big is that library? It dwarfs iOS's and Android's. this also comes with one very important option most business people I have had to support have asked for. the ability to run some of the apps they run on their workstations to allow them to not have to run back to their desk to enter data. You seem to think MS is trying to capture the home user tablet market with this device. They are going after the market they have been dominant in for a VERY long time. The enterprise. future incarnations of this device will likely drop in price and will then make their way to the home users. I know home users today who are hold off buying the newest iPad or Android offerings to buy this simply because it runs full blown Windows.

The lack of a full blown OS actually is a flaw but since all tablets have had this flaw people didn't have any choice. now that this is coming out they will have a choice. I expect Apple to do something similar soon before more affordable versions of these things hit the market. If they are smart they re currently working on getting the desktop OS to run well on their iPad soon. If they aren't then they will lose a sizable portion of the tablet market to Windows as they did with the desktop market. Let's be honest. If someone is given the choice between a tablet that can only run special apps written for a tablet or a tablet which can run any and all applications they already own and run on their desktop which do you suppose they will choose? I know which one I would choose. I'm willing to bet MANY Apple users wish their iPads ran Lion or whatever the latest Apple desktop OS is. The ones I know certainly do.

While I can see a use case for this in enterprise for email, web, documents and Office, the physical constraints of the device and how people use tablets often makes the lack of a full OS a non-issue. People use tablets differently than they do laptops and workstations and the reasons are not just the lack of a Full OS. The physical design, ergonomics, display reflectivity, display "workspace," et al. come into play heavily. For example, I cannot see an engineer running AutoCAD or a simulation program on a tablet. But I can see that same engineer using a tablet to check the status of a simulation with a tablet or viewing the output. I believe this holds true for most other sector specific software that make up "enterprise."

I would be interested in seeing the adoption rate of the tablets within organizations heavily invested in Sharepoint. I can see a real possibility of symbiotic relation with MS tablets and the other MS "enterprise OS."

What this highlights to me is how little Microsoft understands about marketing. Rather than encouraging the world to be upset over the outrage (“unacceptable” in comments here) about maybe $15 of storage space, they could have simply highlighted a larger tablet as their base unit, and listed the smaller one for more compact needs.

Really, the whole notion of Windows8 on a tablet is that you get a “full” operating system, not a “stripped down” one streamlined for mobile. If you try to compare and price it against a mobile-only product, you are going to lose, as Microsoft is doing here. Opinions may differ about the whole refrigerator+toaster thing, but if Surface was the product you wanted to offer, better not set it up as just the Microsoft version of an iPad.

A company that was connected to its customers better would've seen this coming. Next time somebody dismisses Apple as“ just a marketing company with white-label production contracts,” they should look at how this mismatch between expectations and reality can make it hard for customers to understand how to use it.

Right, but that's the essence of Microsoft's problem in this space:

1) Apple announces and demos iPad

2) Many complain that it "doesn't run a real desktop operating system" (and therefore will fail in the market)

3) iPad debuts; is an explosive success

4) Rather than concluding, "I guess those critics who complained about the lack of a real desktop operating system had it wrong; that's a strength, not a weakness," Microsoft concludes, "iPad is selling really well despite this crippling limitation -- imagine how well it would sell with a real desktop operating system!"

Their entire course of action is based on this erroneous conclusion. The iPad triumphed by taking away something that everyone had assumed was crucial. The assumption had to be rescinded. But, rather than doing that, Microsoft simply assumed that adding back in the part that Apple took out would "fix" the iPad's flaws (rather than removing its benefits).

Actually this is far better than an iPad for enterprise use which is what this is actually meant for. iPads, like all other tablets until now, are toys. PLUS try to remember the biggest selling point for Apple and Android tablets and phones is the Apps library they have. Well, last I checked the ability to run full blown windows on this tablet gives it access to ALL applications written to run on Windows. How big is that library? It dwarfs iOS's and Android's. this also comes with one very important option most business people I have had to support have asked for. the ability to run some of the apps they run on their workstations to allow them to not have to run back to their desk to enter data. You seem to think MS is trying to capture the home user tablet market with this device. They are going after the market they have been dominant in for a VERY long time. The enterprise. future incarnations of this device will likely drop in price and will then make their way to the home users. I know home users today who are hold off buying the newest iPad or Android offerings to buy this simply because it runs full blown Windows.

The lack of a full blown OS actually is a flaw but since all tablets have had this flaw people didn't have any choice. now that this is coming out they will have a choice. I expect Apple to do something similar soon before more affordable versions of these things hit the market. If they are smart they re currently working on getting the desktop OS to run well on their iPad soon. If they aren't then they will lose a sizable portion of the tablet market to Windows as they did with the desktop market. Let's be honest. If someone is given the choice between a tablet that can only run special apps written for a tablet or a tablet which can run any and all applications they already own and run on their desktop which do you suppose they will choose? I know which one I would choose. I'm willing to bet MANY Apple users wish their iPads ran Lion or whatever the latest Apple desktop OS is. The ones I know certainly do.

While I can see a use case for this in enterprise for email, web, documents and Office, the physical constraints of the device and how people use tablets often makes the lack of a full OS a non-issue. People use tablets differently than they do laptops and workstations and the reasons are not just the lack of a Full OS. The physical design, ergonomics, display reflectivity, display "workspace," et al. come into play heavily. For example, I cannot see an engineer running AutoCAD or a simulation program on a tablet. But I can see that same engineer using a tablet to check the status of a simulation with a tablet or viewing the output. I believe this holds true for most other sector specific software that make up "enterprise."

I would be interested in seeing the adoption rate of the tablets within organizations heavily invested in Sharepoint. I can see a real possibility of symbiotic relation with MS tablets and the other MS "enterprise OS."

In a business and especially in manufacturing and warehousing setting this thing would be a blessing. I can't tell you how many of our engineers and supervisors would come to me and ask if there was some way I could wipe their tablets and get Windows on them along with some vital applications they have running on their desktops. they complained about how having to constantly run back and forth to enter data they gathers was killing their productivity. I'm sure many others here could see other situations where something like this would be very useful. These tablets are getting more and more powerful. I can easily see them replacing the desktop in the not too distant future for the average user.

"only has a formatted capacity of 59GB; that's five of the 41GB accounted for right there, due simply to differences in counting. Annoying, but the same "loss" exists on many other platforms too."

i doubt it, not a difference in counting. windows NTFS reserves a certain chunk of space for the MBR and keeps it in a specific place so the hard drive doesn't have to seek as much to find it. kind of a useless waste for an SSD.. but theres no way it lost 5 gigs just by being formatted, and it's not a counting error. It's just microsoft being inefficient with their use of disk space. they really need to work on making windows more efficient.